The “Sicilian Space Program” had symbolic importance as well as being a scientific feat, said the three natives of the island town of Enna who are behind it.

“Sicily has always been a place of negative connotations — Mafia and unemployment. We wanted to lift up Sicily in our own way,” said 34-year-old filmmaker Fabio Leone, who recorded the project with Antonella Barbera, 38.

Their heavily indebted island, long plagued by organized crime, has one of the highest unemployment rates in Italy.

Attached to a large helium-filled balloon, a homemade spacecraft called the Cannolo Transporter — equipped with two cameras and a GPS tracker — was launched on Feb. 2. The cameras captured stunning and comical images as the cannoli soared above the clouds toward space.

Because a real cannoli would be unlikely to survive the voyage, the group made a model of the cherry-studded pastry with a polymer clay material hardened in an oven.

The body of the craft was made from an insulated ice-cream box, which protected the camera batteries from temperatures that dropped to 50 degrees below zero.

Atmospheric pressure decreased as the Cannolo Transporter rose, causing the balloon to expand until it eventually burst. It then tumbled back to Earth.

It landed in hills near the village of Bompietro, 15 miles from where it had been launched at the peak of the Rocca di Cerere nature park. It was recovered by team members who followed the GPS signal through fields of sheep.